Whatever you do, don’t offend Chinese communists. Hollywood knows this very well. Not for no reason did the lame remake of Red Dawn feature an invasion of the United States by North Korea for cripe’s sakes. Make China the invader, and the movie never gets released there. That’s a billion people whose money you need at the box office.

Bowl Cut Jr. doesn’t have many cinemaplexes in his glorious shining kingdom.

American companies are terrified of upsetting the Red Chinese regime, and if they inadvertently do so, they will prostrate themselves to whatever extent is necessary recover access to the biggest consumer market in the world.

Have I mentioned that the Red Chinese really hate anyone who has pointed out their brutal record on human rights, especially those who have proven their courage by continuing to speak the truth about their brutality while living in exile? Especially when these darn people won’t die. So they really hate the Dalai Lama, which I guess Mercedes-Benz’s marketing people didn’t know when they posted an inspirational quote from the Dalai Lama on Instragram.

Mercedes-Benz apologized to Chinese consumers on Tuesday for an Instagram post showing one of its luxury cars along with a quote from exiled Tibetan spiritual leader Dalai Lama, whom Beijing considers a dangerous separatist.

In a statement on its official Weibo, the German car maker said it had deleted the controversial post immediately, and offered its sincerest apology to Chinese people, in a sign that foreign brands are growing more wary of the reputational damage that missteps on touchy political issues can bring.

In a “MondayMotivation” hashtagged post on Instagram, Mercedes showed one of its white cars on a beach along with a quote attributed to the Dalai Lama: “Look at the situations from all angles, and you will become more open.”

The post soon drew criticism from eagled-eyed Chinese netizens. The Dalai Lama fled into exile in India in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule, though the Nobel Peace Prize winning monk says he simply seeks genuine autonomy for his Himalayan homeland.

“We will promptly take steps to deepen our understanding of Chinese culture and values, our international staff included, to help standardize our actions to ensure this sort of issue doesn’t happen again,” the Daimler-owned company said in the statement.

Absolutely pathetic. The Chinese public doesn’t hate the Dalai Lama. The Chinese government does. It has nothing to do with culture and certainly nothing to do with “values,” unless you consider iron-fisted communism a value.

Having won the Nobel Prize is not exactly a guarantee of your good character (see Arafat, Yassir), but usually if someone has earned enough respect and prestige to have won a Nobel Prize, then you don’t feel compelled to apologize to an entire country for offering an inspirational quote from the man.

But remember, this has nothing to do with what’s right or what’s true. It has everything to do with access to the Chinese consumer market. If the Chinese communists are pissed off at Mercedes-Benz, they can make that a very difficult proposition and that’s the last thing M-B needs. Maybe the language of apologizing to the “Chinese people” was strictly for the communist government’s benefit. Maybe the German carmaker knows the people don’t give a rip about this Instagram post.

Either way, as much as I understand a business wanting access to markets, it’s awfully pathetic that they feel the need to bend over this far backwards to grovel over something this innocuous.

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